


losing is easy (winning takes bravery)

by KtheG



Series: Two Celestial's and a Human [6]
Category: Warrior Nun (TV)
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, F/F, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Multi, OT3, This ship has my heart, my take on a final showdown
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-08
Updated: 2020-09-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:48:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26352931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KtheG/pseuds/KtheG
Summary: Established fallenhaloguard. Ava and Lilith are self-sacrificial idiots until they're not.
Relationships: Sister Beatrice/Sister Lilith/Ava Silva
Series: Two Celestial's and a Human [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1872385
Comments: 17
Kudos: 80





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> So I am once again thanking the discord server for fueling my ship. This one's for y'all and it's gonna hurt, but it'll hurt so good.

Beatrice was tired of watching her two celestial powered girlfriends put themselves in danger. Yes, she was perfectly aware of their healing capabilities, but she would still prefer to end a mission with her girls in tact and not requiring stitches or pain medication to sleep. It took her a while, despite Ava’s constant observations of her “big brain,” to realize that this was how her idiot girlfriends showed love. They were people of action (Ava having been immobile for most of her life, and Lilith always confined by parental expectations) and it was through action that they showed their love. None of them were good at verbally expressing love, finding it difficult to do after not being shown love in their impressionable years. So Beatrice resigns herself to watching the two girls she loves throw themselves into battle, protecting her and Camila and Mary.

She vowed to always be there for them after, to bandage up their wounds when their healing capabilities couldn’t keep up in battle or Ava depleted the Halo, to show them that she loved them too.

So here they sat, in the bathroom of the little apartment they had found to hide in for the time being, and Beatrice had Ava propped up on the counter while Lilith took a seat on the toilet, head tilted back in exhaustion. It was here, that she muttered under her breath, “just a _kiss._ Is that really so hard?”

Ava hums in question, seeming to not have heard Beatrice (she may have a concussion, Beatrice notes to herself) and so Bea decides to repeat her declaration.

“Seriously, you two. A kiss, or a hug, or an ‘I love you’ is enough.” Beatrice pulls Ava close to her, reaches a hand out for Lilith (Lilith is ultimately the less dumb of the two of them, has more of the self-preservation mindset, so most of the time, her injuries are a result of watching over Ava), and presses a kiss against Ava’s forehead. They sit in silence, watching the Halo glow as it heals their injured girlfriend. Lilith stands and puts her arms around Bea and Ava, not wanting to break the comfortable bubble, but _needing to know_.

“Bea?” the confused whisper sounds so close to Beatrice’s head that she shivers. Ava looks up at this moment, dazed eyes scrunching in confusion as Beatrice’s words finally cement in her brain. She looks to Lilith, looks to Beatrice, and looks to Lilith again before settling back into the warm embrace of her girls. Lilith runs a hand down Ava’s side, the other coming to cup Beatrice’s cheek.

It was in this moment, that Beatrice realized it would take time, time to show them (and herself) that there are other ways to love. She would have to figure it out with them, but for Lilith and Ava? She was willing to try.

After every fight, each one bringing them closer to Adriel, Beatrice would hold her girls and they would hold her. Lilith started giving out kisses before and after each battle, and Ava would place a messy kiss to Beatrice’s lips no matter how hurt she was (“so you know that this wasn’t me jumping in front of you to protect you.”)

As they got more comfortable with these simple kisses, Lilith and Ava (and Beatrice too) came to expect them outside of battle. When they found each other in the hallways of Cat’s Cradle, hands would look for hands, lips would get pressed to a forehead, lips met lips. Eventually, the girls found themselves sleeping in different rooms together, but always together. Ava usually ended up in the middle, thriving on _feeling_ her girlfriends. It turned into pre-mission rituals of sitting in a corner together, listening to each other breathe before heading out to defend the people. There were less moments of self-sacrifice, but occasionally, it was inevitable, for Beatrice was merely human compared to her celestial girlfriends.

**

They had been keeping track of the possessions for ages, but finally, it seemed like a pattern was emerging; Adriel’s possession habit seemed to stem around where he had hidden his armor after he shut off the portal. And so, through weeks of dedicated study and research, Beatrice and Camila were convinced they had found where the last gauntlet was hidden in the ground, buried underneath the city of Turin, leftover, undoubtedly, from the crusades. So they traveled to Italy, trying not to remember what happened the last time they were here (the Vatican blew up, and Beatrice’s dreams had been vivid the past few days. She clung to her girlfriends (from the middle) tighter at the thought of going back). But alas, destroying Adriel’s armor was necessary to prevent him from gaining power from the divinium that resided in it.

So they were in Turin, patrolling the city, keeping a look out for anything suspicious the last few days, hoping to have beat Adriel there. And it seems like they had, there were no stories fitting possession nor were there any extreme upticks in crime reported to the police. But the sisters didn’t stop their patrols or their caution. They wanted to be prepared to go at any time, and so they continued to train and study, hoping to come up with a tactic to kill Adriel once and for all should he show his face.

When they finally caught wind of Adriel, it was through a massive bar fight in the downtown area. The sheer number of humans involved reeked of possession, and so they girls went onto high alert, but that was the only incident in a week and a half of being in Turin. Mary seemed to think Adriel was toying with them, and Ava was inclined to agree given the presence of wraith demons when they had gotten downtown, helping the police contain the chaos. But Beatrice was worried that this was a ploy, something to keep them in Turin while Adriel went and uncovered the real treasure somewhere else. Luckily, Camila and Lilith could act as sound reasoners and reassured Beatrice that all their research had let them here, their prayers and science had led them here, and here they would fight Adriel for the last time.

The second time Adriel confirmed his presence, it was at a parade in one of the outer towns. A big enough space to provide lots of innocent people for collateral damage, but small enough that he wouldn’t draw international attention should another showdown lead to destroying another town. The women left downtown Turin, prepared for a final battle, willing to do whatever it took to end this once and for all.

As usual, Lilith, Beatrice, and Ava were huddled in the back row of the car, whispering to each other, holding each other. Mary would look back occasionally, to make sure they didn’t get too frisky before a fight, hoping to keep the Halo charged as long as possible, but she always felt like she was intruding on a moment. It made her miss Shannon that much more, but she was glad Ava had found herself Beatrice and Lilith, and that Beatrice and Lilith had come to realize their feelings.

When they reached the town square, the women unloaded, pulling weapons out of every nook and cranny of the vehicle, divinium blades shining a bright blue in the presence of the Halo. Ava was looking upwards, slowly turning in a circle, trying to count the wraith’s that only she could see for now. They sisters would don the glasses made for them by Jillian Salvius that would give them a little bit of help at seeing the demons so they wouldn’t have to rely solely on Ava, allowing Ava the freedom to fight Adriel if he was there.

“This one is different, you guys. I fucken’ feel him here.”

“ _Language_ ,” the soft admonishment came from Beatrice, still unused to the vulgar language of her girlfriend, but it was half-hearted. She could feel the fear in Ava’s words, knew that this was going to end one of two ways; they would either walk (or crawl) out of here alive, or Adriel would kill them all.

They walked through the town, weapons drawn, safeties off, prepared to meet heavy wraith possessed human resistance, and yet, they made it to the center of town without Ava pointing out one wraith demon.

“I think this is going to be a lot like the Vatican,” she told her sisters.

“And we’ve prepared for it, Baby H. You’re powerful and can control the Halo.” Mary’s voice is steady in reassurance.

Ava nods to herself, and Lilith takes her hand, squeezing in their little code. Ava feels Bea take her other hand, passing the code along from her other side. With her girls by her side, Ava knows that she can do this, that _they_ can do this. So they all walk with a little more confidence to meet Adriel for the last time.

_You won’t survive this, Ava, and neither will your girls._

Ava stops dead in her tracks when she hears his voice in her head. Her hands are pulled in front of her, until her girlfriends realize that Ava has stopped walking, head cocked to the side, eyes far away. Lilith comes back, places a hand on Ava’s cheek, bringing their eyes to meet.

“He doesn’t know you Ava. He’s underestimating you. You can do this.” Lilith’s words are strong, confident, everything Ava is no longer feeling. She nods, gulps, and continues walking, comfortable that she can defeat Adriel as long as she has Beatrice and Lilith.

_You will die tonight, Adriel._

Ava’s not as confident in that statement, and Adriel knows. He laughs in her head, the sound ringing between her ears. It’s frightening in a creepy way, to have someone else’s voice in your head, and Ava squeezes the hands in hers that much tighter. She pulls her shoulders back, throwing her confidence in with that of Lilith and Beatrice, the two girls she loves more than anything on this planet, the two girls she would die for.

_I can make that a reality for you, if you’d like to see what they do without you, Ava._

She chooses to ignore Adriel, knows he’s just playing mind games. But the words stick with her; what would she do without her girls? What would they do without her? Are they better off without her? Do they even want her for her or do they want her for the Halo?

The thoughts swirl around in her brain as they continue walking through the city until they come face to face with Adriel and his army of possessed humans. Ava drops Bea’s and Lilith’s hands, knows it’s too late, Adriel already knows her weaknesses, but she refuses to give him any more power over her. This is the one battle they will go into without the ritual pre-battle kiss, and it hurts Ava to ignore that part of their relationship. She’s grown to appreciate the small acts of love that they spent so long learning together. But she knows it will only serve as a distraction tonight, and she cannot be distracted. She has a thief to kill.

The start of the battle is a blur, all rushing bodies, wraith demons floating overhead, waiting to posses a body, sometimes two demons occupying one single host. The sisters go in guns blazing (backup is on the way, had been since they first reported the activity this afternoon, but they didn’t have time to waste). Ava loses track of her sisters as they fight, possessed humans getting in between her and the rest of them. Some part of her, deep down, knows where Beatrice and Lilith are, knows that they are holding their own. Some other part of her recognizes the tactic of isolating her so she has no backup to fight Adriel, and that part of her is oddly content with this plan. This way, she can defeat the greatest evil without her girlfriends having to watch her fail.

_Fail you will, Ava. I will kill you tonight._

Battle is loud. Gunshots and the sounds of swords swiping the air raise from the chaos, but Ava is focused only on what is in front of her. Slowly, she is making her way through the crowd of possessed towards Adriel, but he seems to keep disappearing every time she gets close, replaced by another horde of possessed Italians. The Halo is depleting, but with the extra training she’s been doing, she doesn’t rely on it so much in simple hand to hand combat. She dodges more than she attacks, hoping to avoid any injury that would require healing before she goes to fight Adriel. Looking back on it, that may not have been the best tactic, and she gets a knife wound to the shoulder for it.

She whirls around, punching the attacker who had sunk the knife into her shoulder blade, fearfully close to the Halo in her back, feeling the wound close as she pulls the blade out of her body. It doesn’t heal all the way, and it’s with a sickening realization that it dawns on Ava that the possessed are fighting with divinium weapons. She doesn’t know where they got them, but that means that Adriel has a source of the material that she can’t heal from.

Her face falls, and distantly, she thinks of herself like Superman. An all powerful being who can fly and has other cool powers but can be bested by a silly little rock. This thought rings throughout her head, and she can’t help the fear that expands in her stomach. She puts her shoulder down and continues to fight, finding that only some humans have divinium, but most of them just have normal weapons.

She takes a few punches to the face, there’s dried blood on her cheek and dripping off her chin and she had taken a slash to the eye, barely dodging significant damage from a normal switchblade. (Could the Halo heal a significant injury? If she were to get stabbed in the eye, could she regain her sight?) The sounds of battle grow distant as she finally makes her way to Adriel. She’s completely lost track of her team at this point, her only focus being the man in front of her.

Distantly, she hears a call of her name, but she ignores it, eyes never leaving Adriel’s face.

“It’s time for you to die, old man.” She sneers.

 _Oh Ava, I cannot die, you already know this._ She can see the smirk on his face as he puts his words in her head, and it makes her that much more angry.

Hastily, she darts forward. It’s the wrong move, and she realizes it too little too late. Adriel side steps her attempt with the sword and he pushes her further with a solid hand on her back. She whirls around, bringing the sword up into a ready position, just like Lilith taught her. They had drilled for days on not thinking about attacking at all, clearing her mind of all movement, just letting her body do the work, in case Adriel still possessed the ability to read her mind, and Ava is now glad for those hours spent under the hot Italian sun.

Each movement flows from her body, her mind completely blank. She parries his attempted attacks, lands a punch to his sternum that sends him flying back from the extra umph of the Halo’s power. But he is quick to recover, already charging at her once more, brandishing his own sword (since when are there two swords of divinium? What the fuck?). They engage in a complex dance of swords and fists, until Adriel manages to twist Ava’s sword out of her hands and slices across her front with his blade. She can’t phase through it, feels the blood blossom under her now torn shirt. The heat of her life’s essence is hotter than she expected, and she puts a hand to her ribs, hoping against all logic that she can keep the blood from leaving her body.

She allows herself a moment of pause, to recollect herself, before she reengages the fight. She uses the power of the Halo to launch herself behind Adriel and land a kick to the back of his knees, effectively bringing him down to a more manageable height for Ava. She wraps her hands around his neck, knowing she’s too close for him to use the sword now. Her arms tighten, hoping to choke him out for a few minutes, long enough for the Halo to recharge a little bit, but he’s too strong.

“You foolish child. You are _weak_.” He spits out, spittle landing on Ava’s hand. She makes a face he can’t see but doesn’t budge her grip. The Halo flares bright under her skin, she can feel it, as it helps her keep her grip tight around him. He starts going slack, but Ava doesn’t let up until he falls unconscious at her feet. She knows she doesn’t have a lot of time, but she uses the few precious minutes to dispatch of a few more wraith demons, to help her team.

She finds herself fighting next to Beatrice, working in the rhythm they discovered together in the last few months. Lilith joins them, teleporting in and taking out a possessed behind Beatrice before Ava can. The three of them work well together; they’re efficient exorcism machines, and by the time Adriel is back up again, the crowd of possessed is significantly smaller.

This time, Adriel aims his attack at Lilith, using his fucking force powers to throw her into a building, leaving a hole in the brick. Lilith lets out a shriek as she flies through the air, unable to teleport in the grip of Adriel’s power. Beatrice is still fighting off the collateral damage and so Ava takes up a position at her back, hoping to shield her other girlfriend from Adriel’s attention. It seems to work for a few minutes, as the devil and Ava go hand to hand, but he manages a punch to one of her kidney’s that has Ava doubling over in pain and he turns his attention to Beatrice. He pulls out a knife, and if Ava had any breath in her lungs, she would’ve yelled to warn Beatrice.

But all she can do is watch as Adriel stabs her girlfriend in the back, literally that fucker. Beatrice lets out a quiet gasp, hands dropping her gun and doubling over. Adriel rips the knife out, bringing Beatrice’s blood with it, and Ava is horrified. Bea is already paling (fuck, fuck, fuck, _fuck)_ but Ava has regained her strength and charges at Adriel, trusting her team to look after Beatrice.

The familiar crack of Lilith’s teleporting is heard once, then twice, and when Ava looks back, all she sees is a rather large pool of blood in the dirt, but neither of her girlfriends (good, they should save each other, not worry about her.) She trades blows with Adriel, more focused on him now than ever before. The Halo whines in protest, warning Ava of her depleting powers, and with the image of Beatrice bleeding in her mind, she tackles him like she saw on tv from the rugby matches. They go sprawling across the dirt, and then there’s the crack of teleporting, and Adriel is gone. Ava scurries to her feet, head turning, desperately looking for her enemy, and when she finds him, he’s got his elbow around Lilith’s neck, squeezing as hard as he can.

Ava sees the moment the fight leaves Lilith, watches her crumple to the ground, sees Adriel kick her in the ribs, and then she feels the Halo _burn_. Feels the burn and sees the light, and then… nothing.


	2. Chapter Two

Ava doesn’t think she was unconscious for long, just enough time for the Halo to recharge a little bit after expelling so much energy, and so when she opens her eyes and still sees battle, she immediately moves to get up. There’s pain in her stomach, and she’s still bleeding a little bit from the gash, but the Halo seems to have healed enough for her to stand and continue fighting.

When she looks up, the backup has arrived, and Camila is now on a roof, firing crossbow bolts at Adriel from above, doing a good job of keeping him occupied. Mary seems to be holding her own, but there’s an unnatural sheen on her face, darker than the rest of her skin that Ava knows is blood. Beatrice is nowhere to be seen, and that worries Ava, but she trusts her team (“trust you team, Ava”) to keep one of her girls safe. Now she just has to find Lilith.

Lilith, who can teleport, is in the same boat as Ava, gingerly getting to her feet, looking around at the battle, but when she makes eye contact with Ava? It’s as if the noise and chaos disappears around them. They manage to work their way (uninterrupted which Ava’s mind catalogs randomly) towards each other and grasp hands, leaning on one another, finding strength in each other. Lilith’s hand leaves Ava’s shoulder to brush some of her hair back, inspecting the slash above her eye, wiping some of the blood out of Ava’s eyes.

“You’re not healing all the way?” She sounds confused, and all Ava can do is grunt out a choked “divinium” in response (Lilith’s fingers sting against the cut on her face, but Ava relishes in the softness and care she is taking.)

Lilith nods, and let’s Ava run her hands along her ribs, feeling out where Adriel kicked her before closing her eyes when Ava brushes her hand across Lilith’s neck. Luckily, blunt force trauma is healed pretty quickly by their celestial powers, so all that remains are the small scrapes from weapons tipped with divinium, but the care Ava is showing moves Lilith almost to tears. (For someone who usually is so rough and tumble, Ava has learned how to be gentle in these past few months).

There’s a crash loud enough to break their bubble, and so they turn to go rejoin the fight, hands clasped tightly together. And it may not seem tactically smart, but they manage to fight that way through a huge crowd of possessed humans, swords in their free hands. To Ava and Lilith, the fight seems to progress as normal, but ask any of the other sisters and they will tell you there was something… _extra_ … about the way they were fighting together. As if the Heavens and Hell had come together to finish what Adriel started centuries ago.

They moved with such grace and efficiency, exorcising demons without bringing harm to the humans they possessed, and when Beatrice looked out from the back of the van she had been sitting in (all stitched up, blood back in her body and ready to go join her girls, adrenaline still coursing) she saw a blue haze take over the two of them. Never before, had the girls read in any of the books about this type of power. Beatrice thinks it’s because the two of them have celestial DNA now, that they can tap into powers never seen. She stepped gently out of the car, hand pressed to her side where the knife had gone through her back, supporting herself on the handle of the car door. It’s like she’s drawn to Lilith and Ava, feet moving without her permission, but when she reaches them, the bubble surrounding them bends to let her in, and she takes the sword out of Ava’s hand, replacing it with her own bloodstained fingers.

When all three of them walk through the piazza, all movement stops. The possessed are no longer fighting against the OCS, and Adriel seems to sense the growth in power, because he turns around, letting go of Mary’s jacket (when had he gotten hold of Mary? Beatrice thought she was fine?) and faces them in full. His eyes are wide, but there’s a small smirk on his face. In between Beatrice and Lilith, Ava scrunches her face, slowing her pace and childishly sticks her tongue out at Adriel. Lilith and Bea can only assume they’re conversing telepathically, and when Ava’s eyes brighten at the same moment Adriel’s falls? Beatrice and Lilith know they’ve won.

Ava gives a quick squeeze to their hands, the short little code they came up with, and she charges ahead, two swords in her hands and wings on her back.

The wings are new, but Ava doesn’t seem to notice them and so Beatrice isn’t going to point that out yet. Lilith had told them it might be a possibility (“I had a pair when I was in Hell, but I am unable to determine if they followed me here.”) and so Beatrice isn’t really that shocked. She turns to grab Lilith’s hand, prepared to jump into the fight if she needs to.

Together, Beatrice and Lilith watch as their angelic girlfriend goes head to head with (possibly) the Devil himself. Each blow reverberates around the square, echoing off the ancient buildings. There are several moments when Beatrice wants to jump in (Adriel has his foot on Ava’s chest, when he manages to wrestle one of the swords from Ava’s grip and moves to strike her with it, when he actually stabs Ava high on her ribs and she falls to the ground), but Lilith holds her back, pushing forward herself. (“You’re a human, love, and he’ll kill you before you even reach him.”)

But Beatrice refuses to be a bystander, and while Lilith engages with Adriel, she runs over to Ava’s side, pressing her hand against the bleeding wound in Ava’s side. They make eye contact, Ava breathing hard through pain (her nerves are on fire, the Halo is hot, and Ava’s skin feels like a hot stove top under Beatrice’s hand), and Bea automatically takes slower breaths, hoping to keep Ava tethered to the moment. Beatrice helps Ava to her feet, goes to pull away, but Ava instead wraps her arm around Bea’s shoulders (“I need you, Lilith needs you, he’s too powerful for just one.”) And off they go, the three of them fighting in tandem to defeat the greatest evil ever known (funny that the church that told Beatrice she was a sinner for being alive would turn out to be founded on the words of the ultimate sinner).

And so the three go into battle together.

When they come out on the other side, Ava is being supported by Beatrice, who is being held up by Lilith. They’re slumped against one of the small shops, looking a lot like a train of children getting ready to go down a slide. (Mary wishes she could take a picture, the three most badass women she knows (aside from herself obviously) finally resting.)

Nobody is dead, except for Adriel, having dissipated into ashes in the wind, but everybody is absolutely wiped out, sinking to the ground to rest their weary muscles, letting some of the medically trained nuns tend to their wounds. Out of the dust comes Mother Superion, cane clicking against the cobblestone streets announcing her presence. She takes one look at her girls and decides to let them have five minutes to collect themselves before she even attempts at getting them into a car to go home.

Camila comes up behind her, one arm splinted but otherwise looking as chipper as ever, and asks about the Pope and what’s going to happen to the OCS now.

“I wish I had an answer for you, Camila. Let me take care of it.”

With that, she disappears into the crowd of supporting sisters, and Camila grabs Mary’s hand and pulls her towards the rest of their team against the wall. Beatrice is the only one who looks even remotely coherent despite the blood running down her face and the hand she has pressed to her side. Her other hand is draped over Ava’s shoulder, holding onto the Halo Bearer’s hand. Lilith somehow has managed to wrap both her arms around her girls (when Ava sees the picture Camila sneaks, she’ll claim it’s because Lilith is a human giraffe and therefore has abnormally long limbs, only to be called “shorty” by everybody else.)

And so it goes, Mary and Camila joining in on the pile of girls, knowing that healing is easier as a family. When Mother Superion comes back to the pile, she can’t help but smile fondly down at the women in front of her. Here are the five women who saved the world; the most ragtag group of sister warriors in the history of the OCS, the most unlikely family in the world (a non-believer as the Warrior Nun, who would’ve thought, but maybe that’s why it worked, and her TWO nun girlfriends, one who went to Hell and the other who had only faith in God, not the church.)

There’s a small movement from around the corner, a small grey cat has peaked his head out of the shop window of the building the girls are cuddled up against. His ears flicker and his tongue darts out to wet his nose, but he seems content to watch them gather themselves after all of the commotion. Camila is the first to stand, offering a hand to Mary who in turn helps Beatrice up, carefully cradling the other woman against her side, offering silent support without pushing too much. Beatrice pulls Ava up with her, and Camila steps in to stand on Ava’s other side, supporting the baby deer as she attempts to find her land legs. Lilith is the last up, grunting with the effort but standing on her own, arm wrapped around Mary’s free shoulder. And it’s like this that they walk to the car waiting to take them back to their small Turin apartment for a night of rest before the trip back to Spain.

They were unusually loud going up the steps, and Beatrice would have been embarrassed if she wasn’t so _exhausted_. The only other time she had felt this bone-weary was after losing Shannon, after the extreme measures they had taken at the docks to get out of there alive. So she wasn’t really embarrassed (in fact she wasn’t feeling much at all, to be frank. Her body was sore, but there was a pleasant numbness in her limbs (logically she would tell herself that it was the left over adrenaline of fighting the Devil)). But as it stands, she doesn’t feel much of anything, helps Lilith and Ava into the bathtub in their room, moves on autopilot to clean and dress knife cuts, has a hard time of reaching her own stab wound on her back, but Lilith jumps in to help, and then they’re all falling into bed together. A tangle of limbs and bodies and then it’s lights out.

Lilith wakes up Beatrice sometime after midnight, shifting in her sleep, curling around Ava further, and Beatrice follows her movement as much as she can (the pain in her body is more prevalent now, but she only really feels it under the edges of sleep) and is content to be the biggest spoon for tonight, knowing that Lilith will take that place once again (at least until it’s her turn to be the little spoon).

The next time Beatrice wakes up, it’s to a soft groan coming from her smallest girlfriend. Ava has rolled over in her sleep, has tucked her head into Lilith’s chest, one hand fisted in Lilith’s sleep shirt and the other grasping over Lilith’s waist to reach the hem of Beatrice’s shirt. Her knuckles are white with the strength of her grip, and Beatrice runs her fingers across the back of Ava’s hand, willing the muscles to relax. Ava’s hand twitches and Bea uses to opportunity to intertwine their fingers. What Beatrice doesn’t register at first, is the one-sided conversation Ava seems to be having in her sleep. When she realizes what Ava is talking about, Beatrice gives a gentle shake to Lilith’s shoulder, hoping to wake up the other woman slowly enough that they don’t break the peace of this moment.

Lilith gives a little hum, acknowledging Bea’s efforts, but staying silent, hoping to catch the rest of what Ava is saying.

“You’d love ‘em, Mama. I love them. So fucking much.”

“mmhm Bea does… she taught me to read proper… Lil’s can be a little scary at first.”

“I wanna… mhmm. Forever, Mama.”

Ava’s words are slurred, but Lilith cranes her neck to meet Bea’s eyes and her smile is so genuine, it hurts her cheeks. _Ava loves them._ They knew it to be true, given the last couple of months, but they had all been too afraid to actually say the words out loud.

They had settled for hand squeezes and soft touches, for actions, and yet, here they are, the morning after surviving the Devil, and Ava is the first one to say she loves them (and even if Ava doesn’t know that her girls heard her, when they all are fully awake and cuddling together, Ava is still the first one to say it for real. It’s all soft and mumbled (Bea’s worried she’s concussed) but it’s clear. “I love you Lilith, I love you Beatrice, and I want to spend the rest of my life proving it to you with words _and_ actions.”)


End file.
